Abstract/Summary

Geothermal energy development in the UK has been
limited, partly due to the lack of high enthalpy resources,
but also due to the availability of cheap fossil fuels during
the 1980s and 1990s. However, with the advent of
renewable energy sources to combat climate change and the
need to replace diminishing fossil fuels, geothermal is now
in a good position to contribute to the energy mix. In this
paper, some of the geothermal prospects are reviewed and
some recent work from the British Geological Survey in the
following areas is presented:
• The potential of combined heat and groundwater flow
modeling and the latest three-dimensional geological
models are being assessed for use in ground source
heat pump prospecting.
• Temperatures in the shallow sub-surface have been
collated and compared to modeled results in order to
identify thermal anomalies that would be advantageous
for direct use applications or ground source heat
pumps.
• There is renewed interest in EGS within the granite
batholith of southwestern England, and a reappraisal of
the Hot Dry Rock potential of the Scottish granites
suggests that this resource may have been
underestimated.